


half my heart is in havana

by bisexualklausmikaelson



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-03
Updated: 2019-03-03
Packaged: 2019-11-08 09:01:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17978345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bisexualklausmikaelson/pseuds/bisexualklausmikaelson
Summary: Greg Universe deals with life, love, and moving on from Rose Quartz (PearlRoseGreg, Greg-centric, angst)





	half my heart is in havana

**Author's Note:**

> au after ‘change your mind’

―

Greg Universe has always known that he was never the only one for Rose Quartz.

She was an open woman - he could tell from the moment he met her that she had lived far too many lives. But, he convinced himself that her past did not matter. He cared about her present, and he hoped with conviction that her future would be with him.

Little did he know how wrong he would be.

― 

(Her last words to him had always been ‘I love you’. And that’s how he’ll remember her: wonderful, caring - a giant woman who meant the world to him, and then some. She loved him, and that’s all that mattered).

― 

Some nights, he doesn’t know who he is without her. 

He thinks back to those times where she would attend each and every one of his concerts. Back when she was his first and only fan. Back when she brought the rest of the Crystal Gems around - Amethyst would cheer him on, Garnet would offer him an approving smile, Pearl would glare at him.

And Rose, she’d just stare in awe.

As if he were her sun and moons.

― 

Back in those days, Rose would meet Greg backstage.

They’d talk for hours - about everything, about nothing. But, tonight, Greg decided to ask her a question he had been holding back for far too long.

“Rose,” he sighs, with her laugh ringing loud in his ears, louder than any song he’s ever sung. “What do you even see in me?” he wonders, out loud.

Rose quiets down, caught off guard by his question. “What do you mean?” she asks, settling back in her seat beside him.

Greg looks away from her, focusing his gaze on the ground. “I mean,” he stammers, sounding nervous. “You’re like this inter-galactic, magical, super heroine and I’m just―“

“A good person?” she sings, cutting him off. 

He widens his eyes because she was still laughing. That’s the one thing he both hated and loved about Rose. She could never be serious for too long. 

“A human,” he rephrases, sounding sad. “I’m not special, not really,” not like you, he wants to say. But he doesn’t, because the Greg Universe she knows is not insecure about things like that.

She knows him as this happy, go-lucky, careless rock star. Not as the nervous wreck he truly is.

“Oh Greg Universe,” Rose chimes in, leaning her head against his shoulder. She loves how his skin always became so warm after her touch. “You’re so much more than you know,” she whispers to him before kissing him.

At the time, he didn’t realize the entirety of what she had meant.

― 

As is turns out, Rose Quartz was more than he knew.

Pink Diamond, huh?

He didn’t know who she was at all. And sure, he acted like he was okay with it all, for appearances you know? He couldn’t show Steven how he actually felt. Heck, sometimes he thinks maybe deep down he is okay with Rose keeping all these secrets after all. Since, he had secrets too.

However, other times, he’s angry. It’s normal, he’s human - flawed and senseless.

He then discovers another thing he hates about her. He hates the fact that she’s gone. 

― 

It’s a hot summer day and Greg Universe is sitting at the edge of a grassy hill, miles away from Beach City.

Things had been a bit hectic recently - with those giant space hands destroying part of the beach, with Steven almost dying and saving the galaxy, with these new gems running around town―

“I knew I’d find you here,” someone whispers, as he feels a calming presence next to him. Greg turns his head to his side, looking up at her.

“Pearl,” he realizes, as she takes a seat beside him. “What are you doing?” He questions, taken a back by her sudden appearance. 

She offers him a friendly smile. After all, they were friends now - the animosity between them was pointless. Rose was gone. Jealousy was not going to bring her back.

“Checking up on you,” Pearl says. “You’ve been a little quiet, these passed few days,” she notices, and truthfully, he’s surprised that she’s the first to see how he’s doing.

Normally, it be Garnet, with her future vision and all. However, Garnet is similar to Rose in that sense - she liked keeping a few secrets of her own. As did each of the Crystal Gems.

“Rose was Pink Diamond,” he sighs, finally meeting Pearl’s gaze. “I wonder what else she didn’t tell me,” he sometimes thinks, knowing far too well that there were many things about her that he, a mere human, could never understand. 

“You were special to Rose,” Pearl tells him. “She wanted to protect her memories of you, for them to be untouched by Homeworld’s corruption,” she reminds him, with a confident tone.

Greg can see how much she’s grown in these passed few years. She could never be this kind to him before. Pearl was always petty and unhappy with his presence. But, right now, Pearl was so comfortable.

“Rose was controlling,” Greg finally realizes. “She even forced you to keep quiet about her true identity, for years,” he places an emphasis on his last words. And he wonders if that has any effect on Pearl, if she was truly so blind.

“No one ever said Rose was perfect,” she simply offers him, with an honest tone. “She was just Rose, unapologetically so,” and with those words, Pearl smiles.

Greg sees at that moment that she’s is the one who truly knew Rose the most.

“You always did understand her more than I did,” he shrugs, “I suppose that makes me a bad person,” he goes on to say.

And, unexpectedly, Pearl releases a chuckle. “Oh Greg,” she fawns, with a hand covering her mouth. “You could never be a bad person - even if you tried your best,” she lets him know.

“Funny,” He laughs, at long last. “That’s exactly what Rose would say,” Greg recalls.

It hurt, to think of her, to even speak of her. But, he needed this. And so did Pearl.

“You’re allowed to be upset with her sometimes,” she informs him. “I am too,” Pearl places a hand over his shoulder, attempting to reassure him. 

“I know,” he nods, finally managing to squeeze in a small smile. “You’re probably the only other person who truly understands how I feel,” Greg admits.

The Crystal Gem laughs again, and it sounds so melodic. “I doubt that,” she sings. “Rose was very popular with the humans,” Pearl reminds him.

It could’ve been a hurtful comment but, it was a fact Greg had always known about Rose. She was intriguing - of course he wasn’t the only human who had fallen for her. “I’m sure we both know why,” he says.

His memories of her are a bit tainted now, and he’s pretty unhappy about that. But, at the end of the day, nothing could change the way he felt about her. He loved Rose Quartz. That fact would always be true. Everything else was meaningless.

“Pearl,” he mumbles, catching her attention. “Thanks for talking to me,” Greg says.

“Anytime,” she replies. “Greg Universe,” Pearl winks at him, getting to her feet again.

She leaves him then, knowing that he’ll be okay after all.

― 

And the next day, he goes back to his daily routine.

He was Greg Universe: a little messy, very easily overwhelmed by his son’s antics, a bit of a karaoke buff and really really bad at making home-cooked meals. He sings in the shower, he forgets his clothes in the dryer, he still writes songs in the middle of the night. 

And he takes on the world, one step at a time.

―


End file.
